Chinese Snow

I think i was 6 or 7. I was pretty young. Our parents used to take us up to a cabin that we lovingly called laugenita. I think laugenita had something to do with the name laugenour and a plant called a manzanita plant. it was a cabin in the sierra nevada not too far from dodge ridge. memories of the cabin just kind of pepper my childhood memories as a loose collection of moments that i dont really remember chronologically and they seem to spread over the course of ten years and one week simultaneously. but i guess that is the case with most childhood momeries, they're like bread crumbs.

there is one moment in particular i remember. it had to be one of my earlier laugenita memories because i dont really remember how i got there or what happened next. one of the reasons we would go up to laugenita was to "go to the snow". i dont know what it is about kids that grow up in climates that dont get snow, but snow to me as a kid was something magical and i remember my parents telling me occasionally that we were "going to the snow" and it was like we were going to a solid gold fantasy land filled with dream wishes and chocolate cake pies. it was everything. you could have said we were going to the moon and i couldn't be any happier. snow was to me what disney had made it out to be: tunnels, snow balls, forts, cushioning for ridiculous falls, and snowmen.

So, at the age of 6 or 7 i remember sitting in the cabin at night. i had probably been out in the snow all morning playing around and making tunnels and forts and throwing snowballs and falling ridiculously and not getting hurt but i dont remember any of that. the one thing i do remember is looking out the window and seeing huge cotton ball sized snow flakes falling gently through the sky, like a heavy blizzard that is too fat and soft to get dangerous. the snow appeared orangish from the porch light. I must have been young because i dont think i had ever seen it actually snow before. so i got all excited and turned to my mom. i'm sure i asked her if i could go out and play in the snow. now, i dont know if i remember this correctly, or maybe my mom didn't want me to go out in the snow anymore and she couldn't think of a reason why (i can think of a handful right now: too late, its too cold, i dont want to get you all dressed up in snow clothes again, there are crazy bears out at night, etc. so this probably isnt the case) but i remember distinctly the following reply to my childish pleas to play in the first snowing of my life.

"no. thats chinese snow. it is really sticky and it might not come off". enough said. i didnt want sticky chinese snow on me. well played mom. well played.